Sten aka Lawrence held my #1 spot on my Top 10 list of 2008 and his 12″ vinyl single Jill on Mule Electronics in 2009 will probably be in my Top 10 list of singles in 2009. I’m a sucker for these lush melodies over the well crafted rhythm sections Peter Kersten puts together. He uses delay so well and mutes notes perfectly like some gentle tribal lullaby if there was such a thing.
I’m not sure what synth it is but it almost sounds like a faint chime in the melody, I think I heard it in 80’s-early 90’s sitcoms, now that sound is just a killing me its so good. Here’s a big fake Pitchfork review rating of 10/10.

Daedelus and his friends started their new label FoF Music which features split EP’s by different aritsts as one release, clever idea if the artists don’t mind, only problem is if you’re not feeling the other music by the other musician on the same release but that’s not the case here since Jogger really delivers some good tracks too. One thing is that vocal sample Billy Corgan? or does Alfred just have a great voice and we didn’t know all this time.

10:32 is Tim Koch who you may know from the free Ghostly Swim compilation on Adult Swim or from the Merck label if you have followed the Tycho catalog follows up with a digital EP on Ghostly with integrating acoustic guitars, female vocals, and raw found sound in a pretty distant and perfect way.

I feel like I talk about Marumari a lot on the blog, he is definitely a favorite producer, this track called A Girl I Met At the Rest Stop was the first song I ever heard by him, its off the infamous IDM compilation series Bip-Hop Generation. The track sounds like a more up front live Selected Ambient Work track like Pulsewidth but way more calm and slower going.

I guess there are a lot of zombies artist names out there but I think black or wolf might be used a little more, there is one I posted about earlier this week that does Dubstep and a more disco one that spells his name Zombi. Either way both have great output, especially this remix on the latest Zombi EP by Brooklyn’s Escort. The track has a very DFA sound to it, but what you get are these really sped up Pink Floyd – Dark Side of the Moon sounds transformed into disco, hopefully you can hear the parts i’m talking about.

I was in the car with Scott and Sam from Ghostly International and I flipped over this Actress LP. I can see a lot of people not being into it but if you grew up on Jeff Mills or any Detroit Techno that is this simple yet dark n’ dirty style of making melodies on muted keys and a driving kick that is backed up by cheap strings and thinned out metallic hi hat always will grab me up and ruin me until I just end up dancing in my chair. Also, if just listen to the last 30 seconds if that sound doesn’t grab you, its well worth checking. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Its Marvin Gaye, check it out please, it won’t disappoint.

For all the low level sounding ambient fans, if you haven’t picked up the Yagya record then you’re in for a treat. Yagya has this sound similar to Gas and The Sight Below but goes into the dreamer end. Gas sounds like you’re suck in the middle of field and you’re surrounded by smoke thats in the distance but everything is in slow motion and The Sight Below makes you feel like someone knocked you out of your misery during a tragic second and your half awake and half unconscious but its going to be fine because they’re here to save you. Yagya is more of a slowly floating and you have full control but its always starting to rain and its extra foggy but you don’t care because you’re floating, which is always a good thing.

Before djing in LA before Tycho I had to go music shopping and picked up some new albums and a couple EPs but I mostly played a lot of the tracks i’ve posted on the blog. This Bullion track isn’t really anything for the dancefloor but it was nice to hear it loud and see if people could appreciate it. The samples he chooses are a bit cut up but you never really notice since the rest of the round sounds smooth out the mix and the fast keys looping keep you completely satisfied.

After all the Burial hype someone needed to take the raines and Zomby did just that but with a bit more of a punch, I could only find 3 songs in his whole catalog that i liked but those 3 are pure gems.

The Librarian did an outstanding deep dubby techno track that his label mate Teef remixed. The track has this great line in it: “..the queen has been wounded the worker will fight, the queen has been wounded the worker will die. and i can’t stop until you’re gone. and i won’t stop until you’re gone. your heart is still beating…” really worth checking out.

The dreamy at times Paavoharju put Finland on the map when it comes to indie accepted experimental folk here in the States. The band is on a phenomenal label called Fonal, if you have any time to dig you might want to check that catalog thoroughly because they have some lovely releases.

I’ve posted about Bibio plenty on here it feels like but with a new LP out now I had to share something different since i’ve already posted a song from Vignetting The Compost. I found these videos he did for a few new songs, enjoy.

Recently I got sit in on a recording of Tim Sweeney’s Beats in Space radio show on NYU Radio. The wonderful part about it is that he plays so many unreleased promos so you’ll always get to hear something new if you tune in and he does it weekly. I hope to feature a few more sets off his site in the future since this one was pretty amazing and now i’m trying to catch up on some of the archives.

2 lovely groups by the names of The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart and 800beloved came out this month that got me back to digging thru older songs from a few more older well known groups that most of us already know. It’s nice to hear new groups taking hints of older material that is really specific sounding that inspired them and pushing it thru 2009 that is full of awful pop, weakened indie rock, and stagnant dance music. I truly feel like both these groups need to be heard since I would love to be dancing to music like this with a bunch of friends over most of what is out there not because its soo much better but it would be a perfect change of pace.

One of my favorite simple album covers has to be this cover for Cashier Escape Route above because of the subjects involved and that bold light blue with a tiny bit of red always worked. This Phonem track is pretty laid back and brings me back to the earlier days of IDM and how it always helped me on the imaginative end of thinking of new designs.

There are a ton of feel good tracks out there and Blackalicious might have one that hits the Top 50 of all time.

Most of you might already know but Grizzly Bear has a new album coming in in May, this is just one track from it that was taken from their performance on David Letterman.

Here’s a pretty simple edit done by Michael Mayer, sadly I don’t know the original track but I can’t wait to DJ again and play this for a couple minutes.

I don’t post many really upbeat poppy songs on here but its Friday and Phoenix have a new LP coming out and i’m super geeked to find out if its going to be great. It’s been almost 9 years since they released United which I first heard in the Ghostly International office as a intern and fell in love. I feel this track 1901 is going to be played really loud at every bar by June as a LAST CALL song which is good and also really really bad at the same time.

Mux Mool has a new EP coming out in March and has leaked a new song (that will stay unreleased) with the info on the “Just Saying Is All EP”. Nausican has this morning strut feel to it, you know that feeling when your having a good morning and saying hi to all the neighbors kind of like that Blackalicious track Make You Feel That Way.

Alright i’m not sold on this new Royksopp, its not what I like about the earlier material and it’s way too poppy for my taste. What do you guys think?